


One-Man Shift in the Weather

by calenlily



Category: Lions of Al-Rassan - Guy Gavriel Kay
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, F/M, Missing Scene, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-20
Updated: 2012-12-25
Packaged: 2017-11-21 16:31:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,393
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/599825
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/calenlily/pseuds/calenlily
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Looking back five years on, Jehane suspects her past self wouldn't recognize her life now.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. One-Man Shift in the Weather

**Author's Note:**

  * For [franglemand](https://archiveofourown.org/users/franglemand/gifts).



**One-Man Shift in the Weather**  
  
Looking back five years on, Jehane suspects her past self wouldn't recognize her life now. It seems like another world now, another life altogether, that quiet existence in Fezana. In a way it _was_ another world, for the world had irrevocably changed since then.  
  
It was hard to believe, most of the time, that that one tumultuous year when everything changed had really happened. It felt like time out of time, at once too exhilarating and too painful to be anything but a dream.  
  
And yet without it, her life could never have become what it was now. She couldn't have gotten from there to here without the shattering of her old life and all that followed, without that day the most notorious man in Al-Rassan dragged her from her stall in Fezana's market and into affairs larger than she'd ever dreamed of.  
  
The most notorious man in Al-Rassan. Heh. She ought to point out to Ammar one of these days that, really, it was all his fault.  
  
Of course, knowing him, he'd likely as not be flattered. Her husband could be absolutely insufferable sometimes.  
  
She tried to imagine her reaction if someone had told her a year before she left Fezana that she would end up marrying Ammar ibn Khairan - and utterly failed, though not without considerable amusement in the process.  
  
For that matter, at that point in her life, she would have had a hard time imagining she would marry _anyone_. Approaching thirty, far from beautiful, and with her brusquely professional manner and sharp tongue intimidating most men of her acquaintance, she had accepted her future as an old maid. It was a regret, and painful sometimes when watching the attention other women received, but she'd made her peace with the fact that marriage and children were simply not fated for her; she had a good life nonetheless, had achieved other things that mattered more, for did she not have a successful practice? She had made a name for herself, had work she could be proud of.  
  
She took a mental step back and wondered why she was even thinking about this. It wasn't like her to dwell on the past.


	2. First Night

He lays quietly, content to hold her, long after her tears have passed. Jehane is collapsed bonelessly across his chest and he holds her lightly to him, one arm around her waist and the other hand on her silken hair.

After a time he says softly, "We can lie like this as long as you like. It is all right."

She surprises him, though, managing to catch him off guard. Her voice is quiet but firm. "No, we can't." She lifts her head from his chest and kisses his lips, hard.

When she draws back he sees something like desperation in her blue eyes. He tightens his arms around her, even as she threads her fingers through his hair. She kisses him again and this time he is prepared for it and responds with equal intensity.

"Please," she whispers. "Make love to me."

"Of course," he says tenderly, and lightly kisses her brow.

He had come to her house because he cared for her and could not stay away when she was hurting, not with any hope or expectation of sex. But he understands, also, how sometimes when death was all around you needed loving to remind you of life, needed that flesh connection to feel anchored and not alone. If she could take any comfort from his body, he is glad to oblige her.

Truthfully, right now she could have of him anything it is in his power to give. And lovemaking is certainly not a desire he has any reluctance to fulfill.

"Oh, my love," he murmurs again as she slips out of her dress.

He is aroused, yes; he could hardly avoid it with a beautiful woman he loved with all his heart naked in his arms and making it clear that she wants him. Nor can he deny the rush of pleasure when she takes him into her. Being sheathed in her is an exquisite feeling.

But his mind is not clouded by lust. His focus is fixed on being there for her, on bringing her pleasure to help forget her pain.


	3. Carnival

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> AU of the night of Ragosa's Carnival. What might have happened if Almalik had not been there that night? Fairly PWP

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, this one is kind of self-indulgent. But there are enough other ones in the book, it is entirely unfair that we never get a hot sex scene for the _main couple_. I love the tenderness of the one scene we do eventually get with Jehane and Ammar, but I've still always felt somewhat cheated.

This was not what she had expected from this night.  
  
Admittedly, she had not known  _what_  to expect of this night. But whatever she might have expected, this was not among the possibilities. This was so much more than anything she could have expected.  
  
Walking the crowded streets alone, she had been unable to stop thinking dispassionately. It had not taken long to realize she was underwhelmed by this night of revelry, that she felt little attraction to the ribald pleasures of Carnival. She had been thinking she would wander a while before returning home alone like a good girl. She had already been on her way back.  
  
And then she had been found.  
  
They had not yet kissed, but still she knew without the slightest doubt that she would end the night in his bed.  
  
She also knew that it would only be the first of many such nights. It may have been this night of license emboldening them to take definitive steps towards what had long hovered, unspoken, between them, but the repercussions would last long past Carnival's end. Such a close friendship could not but be irrevocably altered by such events. And under the circumstances, she could only be glad of that.  
  
It was ironic in a way. On this night of strangers mixing, it was a man she knew so well whose arms she'd fallen into. On this night of masks, they were revealing all to one another.  
  
But she could not deny she was so very glad that, of all men, it was Ammar ibn Khairan who had found her this night.  
  
Ammar who she'd dared to kiss that summer's day in Fezana she first met him. Ammar whose interactions with her had always carried a slight frisson of  _something_  charged in the air. Ammar with his teasing and innuendos.  
  
Ammar who was undeniably dangerous, yet in her experience kind and steadfast. ...Ammar whom she had helplessly fallen in love with.  
  
Once they were inside his house they removed their masks and laid them aside, and it was then that they kissed. For this was not about the unique license afforded by this night (except perhaps so far as that atmosphere increased daring). They were not here as anonymous Carnival revelers, and there would not be the slightest pretense of such. This was about Jehane and Ammar and who they were to each other.  
  
They went up the stairs. She felt strangely giddy. She was a woman grown, a woman experienced, with no need for shame of her desires. And yet she felt as if she was again a young girl, getting away with something, as she hurried up the steps with his hand in hers.  
  
At the top of the staircase she was in his arms at once. He held her to him in a close embrace, and she kissed him hungrily and pressed herself more tightly against him until she could feel his hardness even through the layers of fabric that separated them. The ache of need within her was overwhelming. She could not recall the last time she had wanted so very badly.  
  
He groaned, and pressed her back against the wall as he ground against her. "Jehane."  
  
She allowed him to lift her up, wrapped her legs around his waist as he carried her through the nearby door into a dark bedchamber illuminated only by the pale blue gleam of moonlight spilling in through the windows.  
  
They did not stop to light any candles, having little attention to spare for anything but each other. He set her down on the wide bed, stretching out beside her a moment later, and she wrapped herself around him again.  
  
The first time was frenzied, urgent. Clothes were pulled off and cast aside with all possible haste. Her nerves were on fire, aching and desperate-needy.  
  
"Please-" she gasped, only to be doubly cut off, for his hungry kiss stopped her mouth and then her breath was taken away as suddenly he was inside her, his thick, hard cock filling her so full, so good.

**Author's Note:**

> Title is from the song _Hope On Fire_ by Vienna Teng.
> 
> Edited 12/25/12 because I decided it would be best to split into chapters.


End file.
